"Sometimes you try four times from the 1 (yard line) and don't score. And later on, you hit an 80-yard pass play and get there. It's been narrowed. But are we in the end zone yet? I don't know. But we're certainly closer than we were a week ago,'' Millis added.

Millis said the defined-benefits pension fund the union hopes to have grandfathered is still in play. He added that if a deal is struck Wednesday, it would take the union at least a day to ratify it because those votes must be done in person. But there is hope the officials could return in time for Thursday's game in Baltimore between the Ravens and Cleveland Browns.

"There are 55 pages and some attachments that have to be agreed to," Millis said.

Throughout the lockout, the NFL's position has been that it would take at least a week to get the officials back on the field because it would demand they pass physicals and get updated on rules changes.

But the officials union has said the 121 referees have been trained on the new rules and have passed physicals with their own doctors, or would be able to pass them on short notice. Union leadership has said officials could return to the field within hours of a deal, if necessary.

The two sides appear to have come to agreement on annual salaries and added officiating crews, but pensions remain a major sticking point. The referees want to continue their traditional pension plan, and the league wants to replace it with a 401(k) plan.

"We are prepared to make reasonable compromises on economic issues, including an average annual salary that will rise close to $200,000 and a generous retirement plan," Ray Anderson, NFL vice president for football operations, wrote on USA TODAY's editorial page Tuesday.

Millis said in a previous letter to USA TODAY Sports that the league wants to reduce a defined-benefit pension package for veteran officials "by some 60%."

If the NFL would grandfather veteran officials into the plan, Millis said the NFLRA would reduce its overall compensation by $1 million over five years.

Yet speed bumps could remain.

"I would call things 'positive but precarious,' " an unidentified NFL owner told Yahoo Sports' Jason Cole. "There are still a lot of hard feelings on both sides, a lot of people still drawing lines in the sand, at least verbally. I could see something being done by (Thursday) or it could take another week."

Hard feelings aside, there seemed to be no admission from the owner that Monday night's debacle at the end of the Green Bay Packers' loss to the Seahawks in Seattle was the impetus to accelerate negotiations.

"I think it's just time," the owner said. "The officials know what they're losing and I think they understand our stance."

A deal would follow a weekend of controversy, confusion and uproar across the NFL -- and the nation -- over the performance of replacement officials. In the previous two weekends of the season, the replacements had taken heat here and there. But in Week 3, an assortment of officiating blunders added more fuel. The spark that ignited it was the mistaken call in the Monday Night Football game when the Seahawks were awarded a controversial, game-winning touchdown on the final play against the Packers.

This week, President Obama weighed in that he wanted to see the regular referees back on the field. Other politicians joined him in a bipartisan chorus. The buzz about what was happening on the playing fields of the NFL went beyond the TV and radio sports shows. It became a prime topic on the regular news and entertainment shows. Tweets of uproar reached the tsunami level.

In the second week of the season, issues were raised about whether the replacements had lost control of games. Shoving matches and trash-talking among players got out of hand in several games.

Angry, frustrated coaches became as issue, too. During the Denver Broncos' game against the Atlanta Falcons on Sept. 17, Broncos coach John Fox and defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio demonstrated their displeasure with the officiating. The NFL this week hit Fox with a fine of $30,000 and Del Rio was docked $25,000 for their conduct in that game. ESPN reported that at halftime of that game, NFL officials called Fox and Del Rio and warned them to ease up on their criticism.

This week, the NFL fined offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan of the Washington Redskins $25,000 for berating officials at the finish of a Sunday loss to the Cincinnati Bengals. The league slapped coach Bill Belichick of the New England Patriots with a $50,000 fine, according to a person with knowledge of the fine, for grabbing an official to get his attention following a loss to the Baltimore Ravens.

The NFL's contract with the NFLRA expired May 31. Weeks before that, the NFL had sent a memo to clubs saying it would begin looking for replacement officials. The contract expired, the regular officials were locked out, and the NFL worked the preseason and the first three weeks of the season with replacements.

The replacements weren't the top-level officials from the top college conferences; They were hired primarily from the lower divisions of college football and other lower-tier professional leagues.

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About Reid and Mike

Reid Cherner has been with USA TODAY since 1982 and written Game On! since March 2008.

He has covered everything from high schools to horse racing to the college and the pros. The only thing he likes more than his own voice is the sound of readers telling him when he's right and wrong.

Michael Hiestand has covered sports media and marketing for USA TODAY, tackling the sports biz ranging from what's behind mega-events such as the Olympics and Super Bowl to the sometimes-hidden numbers behind the sports world's bottom line.